Today, the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum announced the winners of the 2010 National Design Awards. Just over a decade old, the awards are the closest thing the country has to a Nobel Prize in design; the nominees were drawn from solicitations of over 2,500 design professionals. Here's a tour of this year's winners in all ten categories.

Fashion Design
The youngest faces in the crop by far were Kate and Laura Mulleavy, the brainy sisters behind Rodarte, which they started in 2005. They beat out Behnaz Sarafpour and Proenza Schouler.

A look from Rodarte's Fall/Winter 2010 collection

Communication Design
Veteran graphic designer Stephen Doyle won the category, over Maira Kalman and John Jay.

An installation that Doyle created, for an exhibition in 1996 dedicated to the Constitution. Pictured, the 19th Amendment.

A poster by Doyle, from 2007.

A CD case from 2002, for David Byrne. Byrne's eyes appear to open and shut, thanks to a clever use of overlapping, layered images that change appearance with the viewing angle.

Product Design
Smart Design won out over two of its perennial competitors, Continuum and Frog Design. Pictured, a pre-filled syringe designed in 2009 for UCB/OXO. Read here about all the features that make the syringe special--from an easy grip handle to magnified readings on the barrel.

Smart Design is best-known for it's path-breaking work for the OXO brand of kitchen tools.

From 2008, the SmartGauge with EcoGuide created for Ford.

Interior Design
William Sofield, a master of classic elegance, won over two more contemporary firms, Clive Wilkinson and Aidlin Darling.

A private residence from 2008, which exemplifies Sofield's masterful eye for the elegant but funky

A stunning staircase that Sofield designed in 2004, for a Bottega Veneta boutique in New York.

In 2007, Strausfeld designed the "Sugar" UI for Nicholas Negroponte's OLPC.

An interactive model of downtown New York, created in 2006.

Architecture
KieranTimberlake prevailed over Lake|Flato, a firm with a similar ethos and aesthetic, and Design Corps, which specializes in small, low-cost buildings. Here, KieranTimberlake's Cellophane House, a kit of parts that can be easily be retrofitted when the user wants--or dissembled and moved.

Pictures usually fail to capture the remarkable design details of their landmark Loblolly House, from 2006.

It was destined to be James Corner's year: His firm, Field Operations, recently completed New York's High Line park, which pushed it over nominees Andrea Cochran (also a finalist last year) and Stoss Landscape Architecture.

A shot of the High Line.

The park boasts superb details, from the furniture to the transition between the old tracks and new paving.

Shelby Farms Park, which Field Operations is currently building in Memphis, TN.

Institutional Achievement
The U.S. Green Building Council--the organization that created LEED ratings for buildings--beat Design That Matters and Oxo International. Pictured, a data sheet on the Sidwell Friends School in Washington, D.C., which earned a LEED Platinum, thanks to water filtration systems that mimic natural wetlands, and paneling made from 100-year old wine casks.

Design Mind
Design writer Ralph Caplan, who consulted for Herman Miller for two decades, won the award, recognizing achievement in design thinking.

By Design: Why There Are No Locks on the Bathroom Doors in the Hotel Louis XIV and Other Object Lessons, Caplan's magnum opus, which deconstructed the genius behind commonplace objects which had never before been recognized.

For its lifetime achievement award, the jury responded to the demise of I.D. magazine by recognizing its first editor, Jane Thompson.

Some of Thompson's covers from the 1950s. Thompson also served as a consultant on some of the best-loved public spaces in the country, including Boston's Faneuil Hall; Harborplace in Baltimore; New York's South Street Seaport, San Francisco's Ghiradelli Square and Washington DC's Union Station.

Winners of the 2010 National Design Awards Announced

Today, the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum announced the winners of the 2010 National Design Awards. Just over a decade old, the awards are the closest thing the country has to a Nobel Prize in design; the nominees were drawn from solicitations of over 2,500 design professionals. Here's a tour of this year's winners in all 10 categories.